Open Planet challenge by Sony and WWF

Sony and WWF are running a joint initiative to make our planet a better place to live. The two organizations believe that people can do amazing things. That’s why they invite everyone to contribute their ideas and concepts towards a more sustainable environment for us and the future generations.

The challenge is to re-use and re-mash existing technologies and products in a way that would help to tackle the environmental issues. The expert panel will go through all user-submitted concepts and choose the best one for development. When the best concept is chosen, Sony will invest money into the idea to prove the concept, but will not claim any commercial benefit or profit for it. On the contrary, the results will be formalized and released to wide public for the benefit of the society. That’s something you call corporate social responsibility.

Well, let me try.

I am keen to explore and offer the idea of solar energy powering mobile phones. The idea is quite simple. You use the back panel of the phone as a solar panel to recharge your phone. When you don’y use the phone, you place it face down to charge it. I don’t think I need to explain it further, as the benefits to the environment are quite obvious. You reduce electricity consumption (and hence CO2) by producing your own renewable energy via solar power to feed your phone. That’s about it, really. I am not sure why cell phone manufacturers are not doing it yet. Vote for this “flip and charge” concept, if you like my idea.

Do you have a better idea? You are much welcome to join the contest and contribute your own ideas and concepts. Maybe you’ll have a winning one. Here are some of the concepts and technologies to get you started.

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